There is something Tony Robinson OBE has said to me over the years that has proven true for successfully starting and running your own business. He said ‘Focun widding cussmers ankajfleur iskin’ which translated means ‘Focus on winning customers and cash-flow is king’. Even I, a celebrity fashionista, best-selling author and investigative journalist, can sometimes…

The Olympics was a triumph for the athletes, the volunteers and the spectators because they and their emotions were authentic. It contrasted starkly with all the ‘spin’ around the games organisation and sponsorship. Customers and consumers are smart and quick. Quick because the technology to spread the word that people love you, or don’t, is…

In my hundreds of interviews with enterprise owners one of the mistakes, many have admitted to, was in trying to mimic the corporates rather than differentiate from them. The Olympics was saved from feeling like one giant sheep dip from your government and the big global corporates by the sheer energy, laughter, tears and diversity…

Be flexible – there’s nothing like a win-win on price and product/service offer to make both the customer and the biz owner friends for life. Every minute you enter into conversation with your customers builds a relationship and allows you to negotiate a deal that meet their needs exactly. The corporates and government bodies only…

Your mind and business idea you’ll strengthen by getting feed-back from potential customers and people that have got the T shirt from reading these tips and doing what you’re going to do. There are many ways to get your body right and I won’t turn this into one of my fabulous books on nutrition, like…

Choose carefully with your business networks. Informal networks may be best. Most business networking meetings are an absolute waste of time. It doesn’t matter whether they are online or offline, time is the one resource you cannot afford to waste. Many networks seem like a lot of desperate people hoping for a break in the…

I know this may go against everything my readers will have seen before about starting a business. But I am Soculitherz and these other writers are not. Sure, there will be exceptions. If you come up with a brilliant new invention that you’re going to manufacture there may be no alternative but to borrow to…

Whatever the product or service you are thinking of offering, you must test and practice selling it to prospective customers. You might need to change the product or service offer if you find it too difficult to sell. Don’t let the experts lull you into believing ‘business planning is the most important skill’. Of course…

The big difference between business as taught in colleges and universities and business as run by real, live, business owners is ‘guts and passion’. If you don’t have the enterprise know-how when you start your business the good news is that if you’ve got the guts and passion to hang in there you’ll learn what…